The thought of being poked with needles can make some people queasy, but did you know those needles can also help trigger a healing response? A local track star is taking a unique approach to help her find pain relief and stay in the race.
Kali Ringstmeyer is a senior at T.F. Riggs High School in Pierre. She's a multi-sport athlete and a state champion in track and field. For years she's been nagged by hip pain, an injury she sustained during the soccer season her freshman year.
“We determined it was a hip flexor strain, an overuse syndrome, because she is a sprinter,” said Debbie Holland, PT a physical therapist at Avera St. Mary’s.
While she was rehabbing the injury, her physical therapy team recommended Kali try dry needling to see if it would help alleviate the pain and allow her to train and compete as a part of her therapy journey.
“We tried a lot of different things. We tried the good stuff of exercise, stretching, watching her form, making sure she was using the right mechanics and so forth, some manual therapy and she was a lot better, but just still having soreness enough to really bother her. So that's why we decided to try some dry needling with her,” said Holland.
Kali said there was some hesitation at first.
"I'm not a big needle person whatsoever. And after the first treatment, the results were very effective to my performance and how I felt. And so it made it a lot easier to come back and keep doing it,” said Ringstmeyer.
Targeted Treatment for Muscle Strains and Pain
Dry needling is similar to acupuncture in that needles are poked into the skin in targeted areas. What makes the treatments different is with dry needling, the needles are inserted deeper into the muscle tissue to activate a healing response.
“If you have a muscle that's not working properly, when you put that needle right into those muscle fibers, the needle itself can get those muscle fibers to what we call twitch,” said Holland.
Activating the muscle is the goal and therapists can utilize an electrical stimulator to send pulsating charges through the needle and get the muscle to pulse and twitch.
“For one needle into a muscle, we leave it in there anywhere from two to 10 minutes at a time. When you stimulate it and get it to contract repetitively, you get that twitch in those muscle fibers, and they start working better when you get them to do that repetitively with that external stimuli of the needle and then the electrical stimulation with it,” said Holland.
“I do it whenever I feel that it would be necessary. So when it feels tight or sore, maybe after like bigger workouts or something. And I do it a lot more often in season or when I have meets coming up,” said Ringstmeyer.
The results speak for themselves. Kali has been able to train and compete, but most importantly heal the muscle strain in her hip.
“It just put her over that hump to where she was performing better, her times were better,” said Holland.
“Well, it's for sure helped my performance in track and it will help me and my hip just feel better overall,” said Ringstmeyer.
Another Therapy Tool for Healing
Like any therapy, what's right for one athlete may not be the right answer for another. For the therapy team, dry needling has been a really nice tool, an adjunct to the other modalities and standards that are used to help patients. Exercise, stretching and manual therapies will always have their place.
"Sometimes you just need that little extra push to get the tissue to work better. And so it really has worked well for her,” said Holland.
Dry needling is not available at every Avera Therapy location. There are also some conditions where dry needling may not be an appropriate option. Patients who are interested should speak with their primary care provider before receiving treatment.
